August 2019 Meeting Notice & Newsletter

The August 8th ECA meeting will be held between 7pm and 9 pm at Clinton Bamboo, The largest local bamboo grower in Seattle. The address is 12260 1st Avenue South, Seattle, WA 98168. Call Erika Harris for more info. We will tour the nursery, see Erica’s Chrysanthemums. There will be appetizers provided by the club. Spouses are welcome to attend. This should be very interesting and a lot of fun.

a) After 3 weeks in the final pot start a bi-monthly mid-summer feeding program (1 to 2 Teaspoons of 20-10-20 fertilizer per gallon of water). Miracle grow is suitable only for the specimen plants having 11 to 20 laterals. It has too much nitrogen for the plants with fewer laterals. Connies, Dukes, Jessies, Ralph Lambert, Gigantics, Harry Gees, Elsie Prosser are all heavy feeders. Consider increasing the fertilizer concentrations on these varietals. On the other side, most reds and Purples and most incurves require a lighter feeding level such as 2/3 tsp per Gal. Keep in mid that it is very easy to over fertilize. Watch leaves to gauge fertilizing. If leaves become hard or curled then you are overfeeding. If leaves are weak and lighter green then more fertilizer would help. If leaves are yellow try drying them out. If drying the plant doesn’t help try feeding ½ teaspoon Epsom salts per plant or leaf feed liquid iron. Do not over feed liquid iron. Leaf feeding with liquid Iron products such as Sequesterine or chelated Liquid Iron will also help green up the plants. Also, you might need to add some lime to sweeten your mix. Try adding ½ tsp per pot of slacked/hydrated lime. Ph control should be addressed for all your plants. If you have general yellowing on new leaves or green mold on the pot or soil, it’s a sign of acidity. In general you could add ½ to 1 tsp slacked lime once a month until housing. In general a ph from 6.25 to 6.5 is desired. If you increase the ph too much on reds and purples the bloom color will be less bright.
– Continue this feeding program right up to the bud formation, then drop to approximately ½ tsp per gallon through most of the bloom formation. Heavy feeding during the early bud growth can seriously deform the buds.
-Water thoroughly when you water but don’t water until the plant needs water or feed. Jessies and Dukes generally require less water than most, so don’t water them just because you are walking by with the hose. On the other side, Gigantics and Pat Brophy need more frequent watering. In following your watering program, it is good to let your pots dry out a tad before rewatering as that tends to promote stronger roots. Note: I did not say you should let your pots dry out during the starting stages, nor during the bloom stage.

Continue Pest Management Program

Review pest management program every 2 weeks. Marathon systemic insecticide is applied once per growing season to each pot at the rate of ½ tsp per pot to control aphids, (particularly black aphids). A product called Seven when spread around the roots and or sprayed on the plant can be very effective in controlling ear wigs.

Continue Disease Control

For disease control spray regularly ( every two weeks) with a fungicide during the summer and Fall season. Ortho Funginex or Daconil are recommended. Daconil can be purchased at McLendons Hardware. It takes care of Botrytus, Early blight, Rust, Late blight, Ring spot, Powdery mildew and other diseases that we typically associate with the heavily fertilized mums. A word of caution: as advertised on the bottle, always use a good fine mesh Nasal filter with Dacolin and don’t expose yourself, others, or pets to this as it can be very harmful. In particular you don’t want to get any of this spray in your lungs. See detailed uses and precautions attached to the package. Spray with fungicides every 2-3 weeks, don’t wait until the fungus is visible. It’s also recommended to thoroughly spray your pots when cleaning them for housing.

Continue Lateral Control

Side laterals will develop after the final pinch. Select the number of laterals to carry through the summer and remove all other side shoots. Generally the topmost lateral below the stem break is removed, as it is the weakest lateral structurally and easily broken off by accident. At this early stage you should carry 1-2 more lateral than you want at the bloom stage. An old saying goes: “I grow 2 for me and one for the bug.”

Surplus laterals are removed later in the summer using the following guide.
For #1 & #2 cultivars, carry 2 or 3 laterals initially, cull to 1 or 2 in Aug.
For #3 cultivars, carry 5 laterals and cull Sept. or Oct.
For #4 & b#5 cultivars, carry 4 to 5 laterals and cull to 2 to 3 in Sept.
For Earlies (13-15 and 23-25) carry 4-5 laterals and cull to 2-3 in Sept.
For Spiders, Quills, Spoons, Singles etc. follow the guide for #4 and #5.
Note: Cutting back to the few laterals seems to be a most difficult task for the novice. You must do it however if you wish to get large blooms.

Begin Staking Plants

By now all plants will require staking. A 16-24 in stake should be placed along the main plant stem and tied to it to support and protect the plant. As the side laterals develop it will be necessary to add longer stakes that can support each lateral all the way to bud development. Care must be exercised so as to not spread the new laterals too far apart when staking, as one or more could be broken off. In other words let the laterals grow till they can be easily tied to the new stakes.

4. Consider Flushing:
If you are growing in a straight Soilless mix such as M&R you should flush your pots every 4-6 weeks to get the excess salts out of you medium. If you are mixing compost or loam with your soilless the excess salts will be absorbed by the soil and flushing isn’t generally necessary. Never the less it’s a good idea to give your pots a good flushing once or twice. For flushing, fill the pot with clear water, let it drain, refill and drain twice more. After you have completed the flushing, there will be little feed left so it’s a good idea to add a new weeks supply of fertilizer.

5. Start thinking about Top Dressing:
Top dress the pots in late July or early August and again when the buds show color(around Sept 1 to 15). Spread 1 to 2 hands full of your final potting mix on each pot. This gives the upper roots a better growing environment.

8. Start thinking about Taking the buds:
From mid-July to late August the terminal buds will start to appear on your laterals, followed by a ring of smaller buds just below the main bud. It is necessary that the ring of smaller buds be removed, leaving only the single bud on each lateral. This process is termed “Taking the Bud”. You need to let the ring of smaller buds develop to near ¼ inch before attempting to remove them so as to prevent damaging the main stem and primary bud. To remove the buds simply push them sideways with your thumb and they will easily break off. Don’t pinch them off. At this time it’s a good idea to add the bloom support stick i.e a small 16” long stick, tied to the main stem and to the support stake. This support will keep the growing stem straight and the bloom sitting square on top.

As a note we will be changing our fertilizer mixture by adding more Potash after the bud is taken. The August newsletter will cover this in more detail.

a) Reviewed Show rules for Cascade and Bonsai classification determined that there is no need to modify the show rules at this time.

b) Madeline West has asked for our help providing 1 or 2 Chrysanthemum judges to judge the mum section at the November 18, 2019 Cross Sound District of Garden Clubs District show. We agreed to help with the judging and would like to inquire about the possibility of entering mums in the district show. The updated show rules were emailed to Madeline as a resource for classifications and the criteria for entering mums in a show.

ECA will cover the set-up fee. Members will pay for shirts and embroidery fee

Discussed using the clover credit card cube to make shirt purchases and practice using the machine

d) Show ribbons have been ordered from Regalia should be delivered the first week of September

e) Non-member trophy replacement – Mark Ross proposed that instead of replacing the trophy, we should give the non-member winner a large ECA non-member best bloom ribbon and certificate. David Rynes seconded the motion. Sue Joyner will place an order with Regalia.

f) Missing Trophies – Steve Joyner to research

Best vase of 3 incurves,

Garden Variety Challenge

g) Replating trophies – Heidi Garman to research

h) Plant sale chairperson – Erika volunteered to take care of the paper work related pieces of the plant sale. Sue Joyner to outline job responsibilities, Sydney Ogilvie will ask her granddaughter if she would photograph the show flowers so the photos can be used at the spring plant sale

4) New Business

a) The August 8th ECA meeting will be held between 7pm and 9 pm at Clinton Bamboo, The largest local bamboo grower in Seattle. The address is 12260 1st Avenue South, Seattle, WA 98168. Erika Harris can be reached at 206-795-8410. We will tour the nursery, see Erica Harris’s Chrysanthemums. There will be light appetizers provided by the club. Spouses are welcome to attend.

b) Access to the back green house at VPC is limited because the back steps do not have a handrail. David Rynes proposed that we contact Volunteer Park Conservatory to discuss the installation of a handrail on the back steps and how ECA might grant funds for the project. Marc Ross seconded Steve Joyner will contact VPC (Dave Helgeson) to discuss this proposition.

c) Ron Elliott would like to see us contact a local news station for coverage of our fall show at Volunteer park conservatory

d) There was a discussion about updating the ECA web page. Sue will contact Steve Backstrom

Friends of the conservatory open house: Friday, November 1, 2019 6 pm to 8 pm

Public Show: Friday, November 1, 2019 Noon to 4 pm

Saturday, November 2, 2019 10 am – 4 pm

Sunday, November 3, 2019 10 am – 4 pm

Clean up: Sunday, November 3, 2019 4 pm – 6 pm

Banquet:

Thursday, November 14, 2019 6 pm Location to be determined

Monday November 18, 2019 – provide Chrysanthemum judges for Cross Sound District of Garden Clubs District show – Madeline West contact

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